SAN ANTONIO – Texas Republican Kay Bailey Hutchison said Wednesday she is staying in the Senate.
The state’s senior senator, flanked by Republican leader Mitch McConnell and junior Texas Sen. John Cornyn, told reporters in San Antonio that she will serve out her third term, which ends in 2012. She had previously said she would resign her seat in 2010 regardless of the outcome of the March primary battle for governor against incumbent Rick Perry, which she lost.
“Something has happened in our country that no one could anticipate,” she said, noting “massive debt,” health care legislation she opposed and the general direction of the nation. “It has caused me to look at the resignation in a different way.”
The 66-year-old had previously cited her young children as motivation for returning to Texas full time, but she said Wednesday that her concern for the nation led her to believe her children were better served by her staying in the U.S. Senate and fighting for what she believes in.
The decision comes after urging by Republican Senate colleagues and 20 Texas Republican House members signed a letter urging her to stay.
Hutchison said last year that she would step down by the end of 2009 to concentrate on her run for governor.
Then, in late fall, she said she felt she needed to remain in the Senate to battle President Obama’s health care initiative. She said she would stay until after the March 2 primary. And on the campaign trail in Texas in late February, Hutchison continued to say she would resign after the health care debate and that she would be gone by November 2010.
Perry, who shaped his primary re-election fight against Hutchison railing against her as a Washington insider, now faces Democrat Bill White in the November general election.
Perry said Wednesday that he’s glad she’s there to fight health care and cap-and-trade energy legislation.
“I am pleased that Senator Hutchison has decided to complete her term in the Senate and remain in the fight against Washington’s imprudent, harmful policies,” he said in a statement.
Hutchison was elected to the Senate in 1993 after serving as state treasurer and as a Texas legislator. She’s the only woman elected to represent Texas in the U.S. Senate.
